This Sunday (11/20) PARC's Monthly Trail Run heads to scenic Pacifica to run magnificent and geologically interesting Montara Mtn. A California Coastal Epic - from an Oak and Eucalyptus shaded valley to mountaintop Bay and Pacific views, before heading down(!) to a cozy white sand beach. As you can see in this video(!), the crew had an excellent time running this route in 2015.

Most of the route offers wide Pacific vistas on the mostly exposed slopes of the mountain. The long run is somewhat demanding going both to the top of Montara Mtn (1,800') as well as down the beach and then returning back over the ridge shoulder to the Pacifica parking lot. An epic 3,300' vertical in 12.6 miles!

Where: The run starts and ends in San Pedro Valley Park, 600 Oddstad Blvd. Pacifica. Suggested route: https://goo.gl/maps/cfotv
Bring $6 per vehicle for park entrance fee. The middle half of this run is in Montara Beach State Park (formerly McNee Ranch SP).

What: A long route (10.6 miles, 3,200' vertical), an intermediate route (8.8 miles, 2,800' vertical), and a sensible route (6.4 miles, 1,600 feet vertical). Also, there are alternates to add as much distance as you like

This is a remote trail run and each runner must carry at least one water bottle.
We ask every runner to find other runners of approximately the same running ability to form a group.
As usual, there will be a runners potluck after the run, so please bring food or drink to share.

Hikers Welcome: I'll be walking the intermediate route, other hikers are most welcome to join us.

Trail Map

Printed maps and trail directions are distributed at the run. However, do give the plotAroute maps below a look before the run.

Long route (10.6 miles, 3,200' vertical) - Or add two miles by reversing from the beach back to what's marked as mile 5 on the map, continue up(!) hill and rejoin the mapped route at the ridgeline.

Each map has the route plotted, elevation profiles and turn by turn directions. Using the menu in the upper right of the map, enable Hills & Directions, then in the map UI select Map & Terrain, & then expand to full screen to see all that.

If you prefer, simple ready to print PDFs of the long and sensible route maps are here: